Can Officers Effectively Prosecute Domestic Violence Cases Without Vict

When prosecuting criminal domestic violence cases too many officers constructed their entire case only on statements made by the victim. However, victims of domestic violence are more likely than victims of other violent crime to recant or refuse to cooperate in prosecutorial efforts (Breitenbach, 2008, p. 1256). Officers must consider that victims of domestic violence may refuse to testify because of fear of retaliation, intimidation, financial dependence, emotional attachment, and/or because they reunited with the batterer. If the victim refused to testify during butterfly, their statement against the maltreater becomes hearsay evidence. Several recent cases have had a huge influence on how those statements and hearsay evidence may be utilized in court without the victims testimony. In 2004, the Supreme Court blueprintd on the case of Crawford v Washington and found that testimonial assertions were not exceptions to the hearsay rule (Breitenbach, 2008). Since the purpose o f a testimonial statement was to prove and/or establish facts in a case, the defendant had a skillful to cross examination of that testimony. This right was termed the Confrontation Clause. Due to the confusion created by the Crawford standard, the Supreme Court provided more parameters in Davis v Washington in June 2006 (Ewing, 2007). Davis established victim accounts as every testimonial or non-testimonial. The courts also believed this included statements taken during the course of an interrogation conducted by law enforcement. If the declarations were acquired by law enforcement to determine an ongoing emergency consequently they were identified by the court as non-testimonial and not subject to the requirements of the Confrontation Clause. If the statements we... ...ion of the victim. Works CitedBreitenbach, K. G. (2008, Fall). Battling the threat the successful prosecution of domestic violence after Davis v. Washington. capital of New York Law Review, 71(4), 1255+. R etrieved from http//go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA200252467&v=2.1&u=chazsu_main&it=r&p=AONE&sw=wByrom, C. E. (2005). The Use of the Excited Utterance Hearsay Exception in the quest of municipal Violence Cases After Crawford v. Washington. Review Of Litigation, 24(2), 409-428. Ellison, L. L. (2002). Prosecuting Domestic Violence without Victim Participation. Modern Law Review, 65(6), 834-858. Ewing, D. (2007). Prosecuting Batterers in the Wake of Davis and Hammon. American Journal Of Criminal Law, 35(1), 91-106. Pence, E. & Paymar, M. (2001). Domestic violence The law enforcement response. Minneapolis, MN Law Enforcement Resource Center.